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Barbara Fritchman Thompson Diary
Week of 24
January 2005
Latest Update: Sunday, 29 January 2005 11:30 a.m.
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Monday, 24 January
2005
Happy
Monday everyone. I hope your week started off good. It was typical
Monday for me, off to work, quick dinner, off to the gym for 5:30 step
class. I am going in this week at 7:30 and working through lunch to
accumulate some hours for later in the week. I have to take dad to the
VA clinic on Thursday to have some more of the skin things removed from
his face.
Last night I started Crime Brulee by
Nancy Fairbanks which is
actually a pen name for Nancy Herndon. Her main character in this
series, Carolyn Blue, has landed a job as a food writer after spending
her early married years as a professor's wife and mother of her two
children. After landing a book contract about New Orleans cuisine, she
accompanies her husband on an academic conference to sample the various
Cajun dishes for her book. Unfortunately, the first night in town, her
best friend since childhood goes missing after a reunion dinner party
with two other couples.
So far, I am not overly impressed with the plot although she writes
very well. The dialog includes a lot of food descriptions in addition
to the recipes at the end or beginning of the chapters. This is the
first book in the series although not her first published book. She has
another series in her real name she started first.
I have the third book in the series which I may try at some point just
to see if she does improve on plot development. At times she can be
rather funny.
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Tuesday, 25 January
2005
It has been a long day. Sheila was out sick
today which means I did over 200 database change reviews. I worked 7:30
to 3:30 without a lunch break in order to have plenty of time to run
errands this afternoon.
Bob sent me off to Best Buy to purchase an inexpensive DVD player. We
are now officially a cable free house except for the local channels. It
really is silly to pay $50 a month to watch the Weather Channel. There
is nothing on TV these days to watch that replaces time I can be
reading a good book. Plus, books do not have commercials. I still tape
West Wing and we are currently taping multipart show running on
Masterpiece Theater. We always tape up the entire series before we
began to watch it.
I do enjoy watching golf, which is almost always on the local stations
and I still watch the NASCAR races some. Again, I am just so busy on
the weekends that I hardly have time to spend three or four hours
watching a race.
This crazy weather! Today it was warm enough to take a quick walk
around the building without a jacket or a hat. By this afternoon it had
warmed up to almost 50 degrees.
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Wednesday, 26 January 2005
It was another long day working 7:30 to 4.
After work I drove out to pick up dad's lawn mower then made a quick
grocery store stop. We ate a light dinner before I took off for the
gym. I did some cardio and worked out on the weight machines.
Last night I finished up the Crime
Brulee. It was not all that great. I think it's time to pick up
another Sister Fidelma.
Sorry for the short post. The time is late and I am tired.
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Thursday, 27 January 2005
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Dad's doctor appointment went fine. I left at
10 to pick them up. It took about an hour. Afterward we stopped at The Orchard to eat lunch. This is
the little diner where dad and I always had lunch back when we played
golf on Wednesday mornings. It was nice to get a chance to go there for
lunch. After eating a larger lunch than normal and later than usual I
ended up not being hungry at dinner time. I fixed Bob some hotdogs. I
will eat something later on tonight to hold me over until breakfast. I
was back at work at 1pm. I actually have half an hour extra going into
tomorrow which means I can leave early.
Not much else in the way of news. Glad tomorrow is Friday.
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Friday, 28 January 2005
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No update.
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Saturday, 29 January 2005
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Good morning. Yesterday was a very busy day
at the end of a very busy week. I had a call at work around 1:45 from
the local animal shelter about a BC pup that had just come in. I asked
Matt why he called me so soon rather than wait to see if he would be
adopted. He told me he was way under weight and terrified, hiding in
the corner of the pen. He said in cases like this they would never be
able to place him.
Lori, who I met through CBCR and does fostering, is moving back to
California so I knew I could not call her. I called another member of
our group who also lives in Winston and does fostering. She said she
could take him. He is about 8 months old and already neutered. After
getting a meeting place set up I left work at 3 to drive over and get
him. The shelter is about ten minutes from downtown. Sure enough, when
they brought the little guy out he sat now and leaned up against my leg
just as hard as he could trembling and shaking like a leaf. The owners
who turned him in said they did not have enough time for him. He had
not been abused he was just underfed and under socialized.
I had just enough time to drop off the dog and make it out to Tim's for
my 4 o'clock oil change appointment for the Trooper. I was home by
4:15. Bob and I plus the dogs then left for the library before driving
to my supervisor's house for a Spa party. We have been to Kirsten's
house once last year. I tell people to get to her house you "drive to
the end of the earth and turn right". She lives about an hour from
here. The last mile or so to her house is up a steep, rutted, dirt
track (road) out in the middle of nowhere.
She was having a group of us from work come for a Spa party where a
representative of a facial, body product company demonstrate cleansing
products. I am not really into that kind of thing but told Kirsten I
would come to support her efforts. But, that I would not drive that far
without having Bob come along plus it would be a great place to let the
dogs run around. We took the small scope along but, as usual, we were
clouded out for doing any observing. On the was up we stopped at an
Arby's and grabbed some food for us and a sandwich to share with the
dogs.
Kirsten had 8 women, one is her roommate, and three men. Bob, plus my
former supervisor David who is friends with Kirsten and one of the
other girls boyfriend, Bobby. David and Bobby actually took part in the
demonstration. She used various types of facial and foot scrubs and
creams, etc. that of course you can purchase. As I said, I am not
really into that kind of thing plus I am very careful about the stuff I
use on my face. We got home around 11:30.
This morning Duncan spent the entire time I sat and read the paper
lying by my side on the couch rather than playing his usual hall ball
with Malcolm He did not even get up to come into the kitchen to share
my breakfast with me. I had to bring my milk bowl out to the couch for
him to slurp. He must be really tired after chasing around Kirsten's
following her dog Malachi all night long.
Today Bob and I will be moving everything out of the downstairs
finished room. The carpet cleaners are coming next week to do that room
and the stairs. Frances and Al are getting new living room furniture
and I am taking her old stuff. Her sleeper sofa is bigger and better
sleeping that the one we have which is Bob's parents old one. Her love
seat and chair are also in pretty good shape. Closer to the time they
are getting their new stuff Frances is having her old furniture brought
over here. We will set it up downstairs then move the other pieces we
plan to keep back into the room. We do have it set up as a sitting area
now but I want to do some rearranging and move some of the other pieces
out that we no longer need to have down there.
We are forecast to get a winter storm starting this afternoon. Guess we
will wait and see what develops.
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Sunday, 30 January 2005
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We did not get the major winter storm as
predicted but we did get some precipitation. I will have pictures
tomorrow. Yesterday morning the snow started falling around 11 at a
fairly high rate of speed. It lasted long enough to give us enough to
cover the roads and most of the grass. In the early afternoon it
changed to sleet mixed with some snow. Late afternoon and last night it
changed mostly to freezing rain.
Fortunately, we did not get the amount of icing predicted. This morning
we had a decent coating of ice on everything but not heavy enough to
weigh down trees and limbs to cause any major outages. It was predicted
we would get 3-6 inches of snow with the ice on top.
This morning, as I write this at 11:30 the sun is out melting all the
ice off the trees and power lines. When you walk outside it sounds as
if you are in a rain forest with the melting ice hitting the ice
covered ground.
In addition to my usual large family of cardinals at my feeders
yesterday and today we also have a large family of blue birds out
front. I had a couple of different looking birds at the feeder
yesterday but have not looked them up in the bird book.
Looks like all of this mess will be out of here by tomorrow. I am sure
the morning commute will be fine once I get out of our neighborhood
though black ice from melting snow running across the roads will be an
issue.
This morning I complete the usual weekly cleaning then went downstairs
with the vacuum cleaner to do the walls and ceilings of the downstairs
area before they come to clean the carpets.
I shall spend the afternoon working on paying some bills, filing, and a
couple of other projects.
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Copyright
© 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005 by Barbara
Fritchman
Thompson. All Rights Reserved.